“Color is now no longer part of painting, no longer services and pictorializes the empty canvas… The colored stripes, then, are not neutral modules that combine homogeneously to form a multicolored sheet or field, as in Noland’s work, but things with identities.”
John Elderfield in: Exh. Cat., New York, Museum of Modern Art, Morris Louis, 1986, p. 75

Sam Francis, Red, 1955-56
Private Collection. Art © 2021 SAM FRANCIS FOUNDATION, CALIFORNIA / ARTISTS RIGHTS SOCIETY (ARS), NEW YORK

A masterpiece of shimmering, vibrant color, Moving In is an exquisite example of Morris Louis’s iconic Stripe paintings, a highly lauded body of work which he produced from early 1961 until his untimely death the following year. The twelve vertical bands of resplendent hue, which include shades of cadmium orange, fuchsia, burnt umber, turquoise and muted olive, invigorate the composition with a singular liveliness. The painting realizes Louis’s ambition to ennoble color to distinguish form, pushing the composition to a stunning zenith. A testament to their tremendous significance in Louis’s oeuvre, a number of Stripe paintings of similar caliber reside in major museum collections including the Museum of Modern Art and Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum in New York, the Palm Springs Art Museum, California, and the Flint Institute of Arts, Michigan, among prestigious others.

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The Achievement of Morris Louis

While Morris Louis drew great inspiration from the Abstract Expressionist and Color Field painters of his time, the artist sought to cultivate his own unique vernacular that went beyond the aesthetics of these schools. The Stripe series represents the culmination of his investigations, pushing color to create pulsating form in and of itself. Speaking to the integrity of Louis’s Stripes, curator John Elderfield writes: “Color is now no longer part of painting, no longer services and pictorializes the empty canvas… The colored stripes, then, are not neutral modules that combine homogeneously to form a multicolored sheet or field, as in Noland’s work, but things with identities.” (John Elderfield in: Exh. Cat., New York, Museum of Modern Art, Morris Louis, 1986, p. 75)

In 1952 Louis began teaching at the Washington Workshop Center of the Arts, where he became close friends with fellow instructor and painter Kenneth Noland. In 1953, the artists embarked on a weekend trip to New York City where Louis was introduced to Clement Greenberg, the preeminent art critic and scholar, who took the pair to visit Helen Frankenthaler’s studio. This experience was transformative for Louis, and the technique of saturating the canvas with paint proved a lasting influence on his work. However, as evident in the present work, Louis soon mastered his own signature technique which manifested in exactingly controlled linear stripes of pure brilliant color.

The Birth of Colorfield Painting
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The Birth of Colorfield Painting

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    Two figureheads of American Color Field painting, Morris Louis and Kenneth Noland were not only contemporaries, but good friends. The two met in the early 1950s, when both were teaching at the Washington Workshop Center for the Arts in Washington, D.C.
  • Leonard McCombe / The LIFE Images Collection / Getty Images
     
    Also in the early 1950s, Noland met and became friends with notable art critic Clement Greenberg – the man who would go on to become a major champion of both artists, and ultimately coin the term ‘Color Field Painting.’
  • Gordon Parks / The LIFE Picture Collection / Getty Images
     
    During a visit to New York City in April 1953, Greenberg encouraged both Noland and Louis to visit the studio of a young artist named Helen Frankenthaler. Upon taking his advice, they saw and were greatly impressed by her stain paintings – in particular Mountains and Sea .
  • Ernst Haas / Getty Images
     
    The influence of Frankenthaler’s technique, then in its nascent stages, was profound for both Noland and Louis. Ultimately, the meeting of the three artists became a catalyst for each to create their best-known work.
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    Kenneth Noland’s circle motif from the late 1950’s are quintessential examples of the Colorfield Painting Movement and encapsulate the spirit of the artists oeuvre. As curator and museum director Diane Waldman has explained, “The spare geometry of his form heightens the emotional impact of his color. The rational and the felt, distilled form and sensuous color inter- mesh to create a magic presence. His color is space. Color is all,” (Diane Waldman, Kenneth Noland: A Retrospective, exhibition. catalogue, Solomon R. Guggenheim, New York, 1977, p. 36)
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    After his impactful visit to the studio of Helen Frankenthaler Louis began producing his Veils. The Veils address formalist concerns of the canvas surface as an expansive, flat, nonfigural field. In 1954, Louis’s Veil paintings immediately engaged him with one of the most significant artistic circles of the time under the critical direction of Clement Greenberg and the critic included the Veils in Louis’s first solo exhibition at French & Company in New York.
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    Louis began working on his seminal Stripe paintings in early 1961, immediately following his Unfurled series. In the Stripes, the artist continued focusing on how to overcome the Abstract Expressionist aesthetic that had taken the art world by storm in the 1950s and cultivate a distinctive style of his own. The Stripe series represents the absolute apogee of Louis’s intense concentration on color and his desire to elevate color as an individual force unto itself.
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Helen Frankenthaler, Tutti-Frutti, 1966, Albright-Knox Art Gallery / Art Resource, NY © 2021 Helen Frankenthaler / Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York

In Moving In, vertical ribbons of deep color slide down the canvas in an entrancing palette that beckons the eye inward. The specific, restrained control and evenness seen in the present work was a direct result of advancements in the chemical makeup of Louis’s paint formula. Louis exclusively worked with Magna paint, which was mixed by the manufacturer Leonard Boucour and preferred for its highly fluid consistency. In Moving In each band of color exists as an autonomous entity, bleeding into the fibers of the canvas and becoming one with it. Louis flawlessly synthesizes color and form into a sweeping composition that hypnotically holds the viewer’s eye. Moving In is a defining contribution to Louis’s Stripe series and typifies the mastery of Louis’s practice and relentless pursuit of the purest celebration of color and form.

Artist
Morris Louis